A portion of an 11km irrigation canal caved in during trials on Tuesday in Bihar’s Bhagalpur district and gushing water inundated parts a nearby township, a day before the project’s inauguration by chief minister Nitish Kumar.

The wall breach in the Rs 389.31-crore lift irrigation project is a major embarrassment for the government as it took around 40 years to build.

Water from the Ganga is to be lifted through pumps and released into the canal to irrigate 22,658 hectares of farms in Bhagalpur and adjoining Godda district of Jharkhand.

Officials said water breached nearly 20 feet of the canal wall and flooded several areas of Kahalgaon, a town known for the National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) unit.

The floodwater receded from most areas on Wednesday morning, but the inauguration of the Bateswar Ganga Pump Nahar Yojana (BGPNY) project had to be cancelled.

About half-a-km stretch of the road between Satkar Chowk and Murkatia Chowk was still submerged.